extract, from the prelude

Question 1

‘one summer evening ( led by her)’

Answer 1

personification: ‘led by her’
↳ can be considered an allusion to the idea of mother nature, nature can be seen as female in that it is responsible for the feminine task of creating, sustaining and nurturing life
↳ wordsworth contrasts the role of nature to the role of a human - whilst women nurture a single child, nature nurtures an entire planet (superior power)
↳ shows nature’s power, the speaker being ‘led by her’ suggests that he is not in control of his actions and in a way alleviated blame from him for any negative actions

parenthesis: ‘led by her’
↳ suggests it was added later, implies he was unaware of this control until his moment of revelation when he realised nature’s power

Question 2

‘small circles glittering idly in the moon, until they melted all into one track of sparkling light’

Answer 2

imagery: ‘glittering idly in the moon’
↳ vivid description creates a magical quality
↳ glittering suggests something impressively elaborate or shimmering whilst idly suggests that something is done without reason, showing how nature is transcendent and beyond human understanding

soft ‘l’ alliteration & enjambment:
↳ flowing effect, represents the gentle movement of the boat across the lake

semantic field of jewellery: ‘glittering’, ‘sparkling’:
↳ poet is discovering nature’s treasures
↳ contrast with darkness in second half of poem
↳ sparking suggests something unmissable

imagery: ‘melted into one track’
↳ water melting is a peculiar image; and shoes the transcendence of nature again (nature is simultaneously natural and supernatural)

Question 3

‘she was an elfin pinnace’

Answer 3

adjective: ‘elfin’
↳ mythical & past the world of mankind

Question 4

‘lustily I dipped my oats into the silent lake…went heaving through the water like a swan’

Answer 4

sexual imagery: ‘lustily’
↳ enticed & enchanted by nature, like a loss of virginity -> new & beautiful experience

juxtaposition: ‘heaving’ vs ‘swan’
↳ man & man made creations aren’t up to natures standards

simile/zoomorphism: ‘like a swan’
↳ comparison to one of natures most beautiful & elegant creatures makes wordsworth seem arrogant & makes him seem inferior to nature

Question 5

‘a huge peak, black and huge’

Answer 5

adjective: ‘black’
↳ ominous, the since the middle ages has symbolised authority (worn by authority figures)

repetition: ‘huge’
↳ wordsworth is in awe of the sublime, repetition sounds like stuttering, which may suggest he nervous and intimidated in
the face of such raw power
↳ signifies vastness & the extent that the mountain dominates & intimidates the narrator as he seems to repeat it out of shock and fear

plosives:
↳ passion

Question 6

‘voluntary power instinct…upreared its head’

Answer 6

instinct = natural impulse
↳ when coupled with voluntary & power we see that wordsworth presents nature as controlling, nature is able to control something that even humans don’t understand

personification: ‘upreared it’s head’
↳ to elevate, shows superiority
↳ disconcerting as it sounds as though it has moved

Question 7

‘the grim shape towered up between me and the stars’

Answer 7

(metaphor)

adjective: ‘grim’
↳ stern, sinister, cruel

verb: ‘towered’
↳ intimidating, important

stars
↳ symbolise positivity, the fact that the mountain blocks the stars shows that it is having a reflective effect on wordsworth, he understands the permanence & dominance of nature

Question 8

‘like a living thing, strode after me’

Answer 8

personification & simile:
↳ strode makes the mountain appear confident, calculated & calm, a stride is a king step & therefore shows the effect of the mountain

Question 9

‘there hung a darkness, call it solitude or blank desertion’

Answer 9

semantic field of loneliness
↳ wordsworth feels isolated with his thoughts and wants to reflect on his insignificance in the face of nature
↳ wordsworth had edited the poem for over 50 years and still has no words to describe his event, he therefore wanted to reflect how nature was a moral teacher

Question 10

‘moved slowly through the mind…were a trouble to my dreams’

Answer 10

juxtaposition: ‘trouble’, ‘dreams’
↳ connotates to a nightmare
↳ nature has a long term impact on him, the effect is humbling but haunting

metaphor
↳ nature transcends mankind, not bound by time or restrictions of life, nature takes many forms to demonstrate its power

Question 11

meaning of the title

Answer 11

prelude means an action serving as an introduction to something more important

Question 12

context:

Answer 12

-grew up at lake district
-launched the romantic era in literature
-both his parents died during his youth/adolescence, he lived with his relatives (bad relationship) so he stayed outside a lot
-admired nature & thought it had a moral influence on people
-believed God was present in every living thing
-began writing the prelude in 1798 & continued altering it for 50 years

Question 13

three of wordsworth’s views on nature

Answer 13

1. nature as a living personality, divine spirit in all the objects of nature
2. company of nature gives joy to the human heart
3. moral influence of nature.

Question 14

form

Answer 14

-semi-autobiographical, first person
-explores psychology of a young boys mind (appeal of sin)

Question 15

romanticism

Answer 15

-detested monarchies as he believed in the superiority of nature
-valued emotion over logic
-wanted to restore the relationship between nature & man
-believed in the sublime

Question 16

the sublime

Answer 16

experience that inspire awe, reverence & an emotional understanding that transcends rational thought and words or language.l

Question 17

structure

Answer 17

epic poem:
↳ long, narrative pieces that deal with exciting, action packed, events and a heroic protagonist (nature personified)
↳ first forms of poetry

no stanzas:
↳ lost in thought
↳ causes reader to feel breathless - reflects how wordsworth was
overwhelmed by the immensity of the mountain and nature
↳ readers can empathise with the speaker’s sense of awe
-stanza drags on &builds tension

enjambment:
↳ intensifies breathless pace, prevents the reader from pausing, makes poem feel endless and immense

Question 18

extra language:

Answer 18

loss of eloquence:
↳ as the poem progresses and the speaker becomes overwhelmed by the mountain the language becomes less sophisticated
↳ start of the poem = language is poetic and descriptive (elfin pinnace)
↳ end of poem = language is more simplistic and clumsy (huge peak, black and huge)

Question 19

3 parts of the prelude

Answer 19

1. light & carefree tone, bucolic, pretty
2. fear, numinous feeling
3. reflection

Question 20

who wrote the prelude?

Answer 20

william wordsworth